Contrarian reader Stan Jones offers further evidence of 21st Century North America's altered perception of weight: Footage of the Benny Goodman Orchestra playing Sing, Sing, Sing in 1937. Those are some skinny musicians. Note especially Harry James, whose solo begins 38 seconds into the tune: (That is, of course, Gene Krupa on drums, and Goodman himself on clarinet.) As a former TV host, Glennie Langille has first hand experience with society's social expectations around weight. She offers a skeptical view of the notion that skinny equals healthful: My first observation is that the original photo of Kennedy makes him appear to have an enormous...

22 January, 2011

The John F. Kennedy Library in Boston has released a huge trove of digitized images and recordings of the late president. Alexis Madrigal, The Atlantic's tech blogger, has published a selection. Here's what struck me: As a young naval officer, Kennedy was certainly slim, but no one would have thought him gaunt or emaciated. Yet Kennedy's Navy ID card reveals that he was six feet tall and weighed just 150 pounds. Six feet, 150 pounds! How our standards of girth have changed (as previously noted)....

15 January, 2011